“A weaver has gone missing. You’re needed. And once you find her and bring her home, you’re going to stop this childish need to rebel and undergo the placing ceremony.”
Sugar lumps and shitstorms, seems like maybe my destiny’s caught up with me.
2
Echo
There’s a man in my kitchen.
That’s my first observation as I stumble in search of coffee the next morning.
It’s not just that which is alarming. There’s a man, dressed in a trench coat, sitting at my kitchen table and eating my waffles.
He’s remarkably handsome, with dark blonde hair that’s coiled into perfect curls, high cheekbones and a thick, pouty lower lip that just begs to be sucked on. He looks kind of like an angel. An angel in a trench coat.
But still… there’s a strange man, dressed like a flasher… in my kitchen. Jet’s still snoring her head off in her bedroom. So how the heck did he get in here?
Did she let this guy in and then go back to sleep?
“What are you doing?” I ask. Not ‘who the hell are you’, even though that seems a lot more natural as responses go.
He stands up from the table and stretches his hand to me.
“My name’s Soren. I’m hunting for a missing weaver.”
He’s… a cop? If I squint, he looks like one from an 80s human movie. If he rolled his sleeves up and revealed robot arms or something.
“I told him he looked like an asshole in the coat, but did he listen?” A deep male voice says from somewhere behind me. I don’t turn around, too busy focusing all my attention on the possible robo-cop slash flasher at my table.
“Did, er, did my sister let you in?” I ask.
“She seemed a little worse for wear,” he replies. Which isn't an answer to my question.
“That’ll have been last night’s second bottle of wine. Always the killer,” I say, and I’m sure that for a moment his eyesglowwith blue luminescent light, like a jellyfish or something. But the next second, they’re back to being their regular… blue. Cornflower blue. The type of eyes that make it hard to breathe.
Then I realize that I’m staring into this guy’s eyes like a lovesick fool and give myself a little shake, throwing him my sunniest smile.
“So… the missing weaver,” I say.
“Yes, babe. That’s why we’re here.”
There’s that voice in my head again. It’s deep, gruff even, and it makes my insides go all warm and tingly.
Must be my hormones playing havoc.
The next minute, the toilet flushes, and I glance over as the bathroom door opens. I can hear my sister snoring at the other end of the apartment, so this must be another intruder.
Out steps… a massive dog that looks like a cross between a wolfhound and a doberman. It. Is. Massive. Like a small horse. A pony, whatever.
It blinks two chocolate brown eyes at me and I wait for the person who flushed the toilet to step out next.
But no one does.
That’s one well-trained dog.
“You smell so good. What is that?” The dog snuffles at my hand and then my jean-covered thigh just as the voice in my head speaks again.
“Uh, I’ve not showered yet, so I guess that’s just how I smell,” I say out loud, although I’m not entirely sure who I’m talking to. The dog wags its tail and plumps down on the floor beside me, its back touching my shin.
